I noticed on some Snowmobile forums that I post on that they have the EXACT same problem we were having here. So it does not seem to be specific to any one type of community. Those forums are vBulletin though, so its also not specific to certain forum software either. The posts over there though look to at least be generated content on assumed subject material. The best one I saw was a computer generated conversation attempting to describe rebuilding this engine and getting some amazing result out of the rebuild process... The moderators took it down otherwise It would have been interesting to share with you guys

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." Thomas Watson, chairman of IBM, 1943

I've been clicking that little warning sign to try and report threads, but I keep getting the "this thread has already been reported message"

It's a little disappointing that I don't get to be "FIRST!" to notice, but after a couple of attempts across various threads I tend to feel good about the TR forums and that we've got concerned citizens here doing their part. I take pride in the fact that I'm doing my part too, even if I don't get to do the report.

And then the intro to the Verhoven Starship Troopers movie (and show) plays in my head. I hear some fanfare and a whole bunch of voices saying "I'm doing my part..."

TaBoVilla wrote:Clearly, the solution here is to include multiple choice rhetorical questions when signing new users, stuff only lurkers know, such as:

While these are hilarious, and would obviously work (though like yogibbear I'm a little unclear on the right answer to that last question) it would also work to keep out the people who may not lurk frequently enough to know those answers but may still need to register suddenly to get a technical problem fixed, and you don't want to keep those people out.

gbcrush wrote:It's a little disappointing that I don't get to be "FIRST!" to notice, but after a couple of attempts across various threads I tend to feel good about the TR forums and that we've got concerned citizens here doing their part. I take pride in the fact that I'm doing my part too, even if I don't get to do the report.

Try reading the forums after midnight PDT. That's when I see spam comments that I end up being the first to report (a couple of times a week on average). Although when there are 8 or more of them in a row it's a bit tedious (it's actually easier to just query the "user's" posts and then just work through that set).

bthylafh wrote:Can we get a "report this post" link for the article comments? There's a spam on the article about Chrome tab syncing, for instance.

Yeah, that's just one of the ways the front page commenting system is different from and inferior to the forum system (I especially miss the preview button).

gbcrush wrote:It's a little disappointing that I don't get to be "FIRST!" to notice, but after a couple of attempts across various threads I tend to feel good about the TR forums and that we've got concerned citizens here doing their part. I take pride in the fact that I'm doing my part too, even if I don't get to do the report.

Try reading the forums after midnight PDT. That's when I see spam comments that I end up being the first to report (a couple of times a week on average). Although when there are 8 or more of them in a row it's a bit tedious (it's actually easier to just query the "user's" posts and then just work through that set)

I agree. I've had the most success after 2 AM EDT.

On a related note, am as curious as bthylafh in this post in finding out who has successfully reported the most spam.

JohnC wrote:2) Don't allow links in posts for new users until they make a certain amount of posts (to prevent human "bots" from spamming). Yea, they can just make some "fluff" posts to get their post count up, but honestly, how many will bother doing that, especially if you also enable a timer for such new posters (like only allowing 1 post/hour for them)?Further potential tweaks: IP range bans for obvious spam posters (some legit users can be caught too, but highly unlikely if the IP range is very narrow and is temporary). Something similar might also work. I definitely disagree with requiring people to pay ANY amount of $$$ to make posts or register on forums.

Yeah the going trend (lately) have been signatures with links.

The last two spam threads today have signatures with links. Not really sure why spam users would enter a signature instead of link bombing a post. However, if that is a trend, would it be possible to at least disable signatures for new users, or request a mod to enable links in signatures? Am assuming most users don't need links in signatures. In this thread, only 5 users have link signatures and 2 of them are TR links.

Ok guys, we've put new spam-blocking measures tied into our registration form. It's an automatic check against a database of known spammer accounts. This should ease both the forum and the frontpage comment spamming, since they're tied together.

There is a fixed amount of intelligence on the planet, and the population keeps growing :(

Yea! Anything that cuts down on the success of spammers is a good move. (Okay, anything that doesn't hurt the usefulness of the site. ) I hope this addition works out for you. I know adding that capability cut out most of the spam that we were getting. More than registration questions or requiring email validation.

We've spent a fair amount of time looking into solutions. 8-ball says that yes, the problem is real and very widespread, everyone just scrambling as fast as they can coming up with solutions. Been that way since e-mail spam was invented.

There is a fixed amount of intelligence on the planet, and the population keeps growing :(